Stanford: Math lecturer made wrestlers ‘uncomfortable’ but did not commit sexual harassment

Share this:

PALO ALTO, CALIFORNIA – OCTOBER 2018: The empty wrestling practice facility at Stanford University. Stanford has launched a sexual-misconduct investigation of lecturer Hung Le for allegedly harassing former members of the Stanford wrestling team. Le, who has a 25-year affiliation with the team, including nearly a decade on the board of directors of its youth program, denies any untoward behavior. (Elliot Almond/Bay Area News Group)

PALO ALTO — Stanford University on Friday concluded that a math lecturer may have made a group of former wrestlers “uncomfortable” when he routinely showed up to shower with the team years ago but said there is not sufficient evidence to show it was sexual harassment.

The decision comes a day after this ews organization reported seven former wrestlers had come forward earlier this year to complain that the lecturer, Hung Le, would follow them into showers after practices and leer at them — and that some of their coaches knew of his behavior but did nothing to stop it. Both Le and the coaches have disputed the claims.

Le, who had a 25-year affiliation with the wrestling program, declined to comment Friday on the findings from the university’s Title IX office, which investigates sexual harassment complaints. But Josh Brown, a wrestler from the early 2000s, wasn’t surprised by the report’s conclusions because he didn’t think the school took the allegations seriously.

“I can say that my interactions with the Title IX (investigators) led me to believe this was the finding they were planning on making from Day One,” Brown said Friday.

In a lengthy statement that did not identify Le, the university said: “While the investigation acknowledges that some conduct of the individual in the period up to 2010 may have made some wrestlers uncomfortable, it concludes that there is not sufficient evidence that a violation of Stanford’s sexual harassment policy occurred.”

Many of the allegations dated back more than a decade when the Stanford wrestling team used a locker room that was part of a university recreational facility. Since 2014, the team has moved into a locker room with shower facilities exclusive for athletes.

“We acknowledge and regret the discomfort that individual student-athletes may have felt as a result of the shower facilities that were available at the time,” Stanford said in the statement. “The outcome of the investigation is not intended to communicate any invalidation of the feelings or perceptions of those wrestlers who reported concerns. The outcome reflects the determination that the evidence gathered does not establish a policy violation.”

Investigators interviewed more than 30 individuals, including former wrestlers and coaches, according to the statement. However, three former wrestlers who told this news organization that they were disturbed by Le’s behavior said that they had not been interviewed by Stanford investigators.

One of the wrestlers who was interviewed, Imad Kharbush, said he was disappointed with the findings.

“I question the legitimacy of the investigation given that they came to the conclusion that they did with all the evidence to the contrary,” said Kharbush, a one-time Pac-10 champion.

However, Stanford’s statement on Friday said the university’s investigators “found that much of the evidence in this case was disputed.”

“Many of the wrestlers interviewed were not discomforted by the individual’s conduct, some were, and others reflected that any discomfort they experienced was a product of their own relative immaturity at the time,” the statement said.

The former wrestlers’ complaints came in the wake of sexual abuse scandals at other big-time college programs such as Ohio State, where wrestlers alleged similar but more lurid shower behavior. Unlike sex scandals at Penn State and Michigan State, Stanford wrestlers didn’t allege physical abuse.

Katherine Emerick, a California forensic psychologist with expertise in sexual harassment, called Stanford’s statement “a typical bureaucratic minimization of the comfort of students.”

“Just because some weren’t uncomfortable doesn’t mean that it didn’t rise to a level of an injury,” she said Friday. The wrestlers “know leering from other normal locker room behavior. They know what appropriate behavior is and if he was out of bounds somehow.”

Stanford began its investigation this summer after several former wrestlers made the allegations, which cover a period from 2002-2010.

The allegations surfaced when a former wrestler raised concerns with fellow alumni after learning of Le’s position with the Cardinal Wrestling Club, the program’s youth team. There were no allegations of wrongdoing against Le involving the youth club or Stanford’s current wrestling team.

Stanford had investigated complaints about Le’s behavior in 2011 after a friend of an unidentified wrestler brought forward similar accusations. An athletic department official cleared Le of misconduct at the time but told him to avoid team showers and one-on-one encounters with wrestlers going forward.

In previous interviews with this news organization, Le called the complaints a misunderstanding, saying it was only coincidental that he showered when the wrestlers did after he went running — although several wrestlers found it puzzling that Le would be waiting in the locker room no matter when their practices ended.

Most of the wrestlers acknowledge they didn’t complain to coaches or university officials at the time because they were embarrassed or just went along with teammates who joked about it. But, they said, they now realized that was wrong.

In its statement Friday, Stanford said it encouraged anyone with new information to reach out to its Title IX office and that the university may re-open the investigation if necessary.

“The university has taken the reported concerns seriously and has investigated them rigorously,” the statement said. “Our commitment is to conduct such investigations thoroughly, fairly and impartially, respecting the privacy rights of all participants as well as the safety and well being of our campus community.”